Press Briefing Wednesday, 17th March 2010
Smt. Jayanthi Natarajan addressed the media today.


Smt. Jayanthi Natarajan summed up the most important event that happened during this brief session of Parliament - the historic passing of the Women’s Reservation Bill in the Rajya Sabha and the fact that it was the commitment in our manifesto - a commitment made over the years to fulfill the aspirations of women all over the country in continuation of Shri Rajiv Gandhi’s dreams whereby he ensured reservation of seats for women in local bodies and, as you are aware, over 46% are now women who occupy elected offices in local bodies. We strongly condemn the ugly incidents that once again marked the discussion of the legislation in Rajya Sabha, the attack on the person of Vice President, the behavior of the members who tried to block the discussion of the Bill and we hope that when it comes to Lok Sabha, it will be discussed in atmosphere of calm reason without any violence or ugly incidents and we reiterate our commitment to the early passage of the Women’s Reservation Bill.

On a question of the removal of Shri Satyavrat Chaturvedi from some post which he was not holding in the first place, Smt. Natarajan said that the Chairman of the Media Cell has already answered and commented upon this particular issue and she has nothing further to add to that.

To a question that keeping in mind all kind of opposition now coming in from those people who supported the Bill in Rajya Sabha, does the Congress party feel that they will be able to get the Bill passed in the same form in Lok Sabha, Smt. Natarajan said we are absolutely confident that our allies will remain with us and we will be able to get the Women’s Reservation Bill passed without any problem in the Lok Sabha in the same format. Smt. Natarajan further said that we will discuss this issue within ourselves and are committed to get the Women’s Reservation Bill passed in the Lok Sabha without any problem.

On the question of quota within quota in the Women’s Reservation Bill, Smt. Natarjan said that the Congress party has considered this issue expansively and have kept the options open for the Government to effect any changes if situation warrants but at this point of time, we reiterate our commitment to get the Bill passed in the same form without any changes.

On the reaction of the Congress party on the news report that a girl child was raped in Haryana by her uncle, Smt. Natarajan said that this is an outrageous, shocking and unacceptable incident. We condemn it totally and whole heartedly and it should never be allowed and stern action should be taken against the culprit and to stop this kind of incident from ever happening.

On garlanding of UP Chief Minister, Smt. Natarajan said that our General Secretary In-Charge of UP has already commented extensively about that. She added that Mayawati is ‘Daulat Ki Beti’ and said that appropriate authorities should go into this and we would like to know what is the source of the money and further added that in a democracy it should be transparent. It is ironical that though she announced that there is no money to give relief to the victims of stampede at Partapgarh, this kind of money is being offered to her in the garland.

On the question of dual membership, Smt. Natarajan said that it came up in a very distant way but we dismissed it having been already tried before and something which will not be satisfactory in terms of proper membership.



Tom Vadakkan
Secretary, AICC